Jackie Buntan confident that ONE Championship will boost Muay Thai in the US

When Jackie Buntan enters the Circle on Friday, May 5, she will have a big opportunity to help Muay Thai explode throughout North America.

The Californian will meet Diandra Martin in a strawweight Muay Thai fight on the main card of ONE Fight Night 10: Johnson vs. Moraes III on Prime Video, and it will be remembered as the promotion's first on-ground live event in the United States.

Although combat sports are popular in North America, MMA and boxing dominate the scene.

Muay Thai is still minor in comparison to its sporting brothers, but Jackie Buntan feels this is simply because they haven't yet been exposed to ONE's all-striking format.

The former ONE Strawweight Muay Thai World Championship challenger believes that the big platform and slick production provided by the world's greatest martial arts organisation will demonstrate that Muay Thai is on par with its peers.

“American fans should be extremely excited, and from what I take in, they are extremely excited. This is a huge thing in Muay Thai – an organization of this magnitude, ONE Championship, not just bringing Muay Thai to the big screen, but bringing it to the States with that much ammo,” she said in a recent interview with ONE Championship.

She also noted that it is a big win for the Muay Thai Community in the United States.

“Of course, there’s Muay Thai in the states, local shows. When I was an amateur, I competed in empty gyms or little local casinos with crowds of 50 or 100 people. But the only big fights you can see here in the States are all MMA fights. So for fans within the Muay Thai community, this is a big win for us. But fans outside of the community, they really don’t know what they’re in for,” she added.

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What do you think of the upcoming ONE Championship event in the United States? Let us know in the comments below.

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